Goals: NASA's New Horizons spacecraft is designed to make the first close-up study of Pluto and its moons and other icy worlds in the distant Kuiper Belt. The spacecraft has seven scientific instruments to study the atmospheres, surfaces, interiors and intriguing environments of Pluto and its distant neighbors.

Accomplishments: On 14 July 2015 at 11:49:58 UTC (7:49:58 EDT), New Horizons became the first spacecraft to explore Pluto up close. The successful flyby yielded science results that will be beamed back to Earth over the next 16 months. The mission has potential additional Kuiper Belt targets to possibly explore in the coming years.

After traveling some 5 billion kilometers (3 billion miles), New Horizons must thread a celestial needle and fly through a circle only 300 kilometers (about 186 miles) in diameter to accomplish its science objectives.

New Horizons carries the first instrument to be designed, built and flown by students on an interplanetary spacecraft -- Venetia, a dust counter named for the girl who named Pluto (above).